Three-Burned Queen Anne Railroad Hotel Near Hot Springs
1 Iris Ln, Montezuma, NM 87731
Research updated May 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
Free
Student-led tours are offered on pre-scheduled dates at no charge. Contact UWC-USA to inquire about tour availability.
Access
Limited Access
Sloped grounds; historic building with multiple floors
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1886 · New Mexico Architectural History · Santa Fe Railroad History · International Education
The property northwest of Las Vegas, New Mexico has burned twice and survived a third time. The first structure on this site went up in 1881 — notable as one of the first buildings in New Mexico to use electric lighting. It burned. A replacement, constructed in 1885, shared the same distinction and the same fate.
The Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad responded in 1886 with the structure that stands today: a 90,000-square-foot, Queen Anne-style hotel designed by the Chicago firm Burnham and Root. The railroad positioned the resort to capitalize on the natural hot springs adjacent to the site, widely believed at the time to provide relief for tuberculosis and other conditions. Distinguished guests arrived accordingly — President Theodore Roosevelt and General William Tecumseh Sherman visited the current structure; Presidents Ulysses S. Grant and Rutherford B. Hayes had visited the earlier predecessor hotels on the same site before both burned.
The hotel closed October 31, 1903, deemed unprofitable. Over the following decades the building accumulated occupants: boxer Jim Flynn trained there in 1912; the YMCA briefly held it; a Baptist college operated from 1922 to 1931; the Catholic Church purchased it in 1937 and ran it as a Jesuit seminary for Mexican priests until 1972.
In 1977, the Jesuits rented the building as a location for the low-budget horror film The Evil (released 1978). Four years later, oil magnate Armand Hammer purchased the 100-acre property and dedicated it to United World College. An extensive restoration between 2000 and 2001, costing more than $10.5 million, returned the building to working order.
The building is now designated the Davis International Center and serves as the primary campus building for UWC-USA. It is not generally open to the public but is accessible on pre-scheduled student-led tour dates.
Sources
The haunted reputation of the Montezuma Castle is diffuse rather than tightly focused on a single event or figure. Two recurring elements stand out in accumulated accounts.
The first is music — specifically opera, heard in rooms where no one is present and no audio system is operating. The acoustics of a 90,000-square-foot Victorian hotel are substantial; sound travels through its corridors in ways that can be disorienting, and the explanation of architectural acoustic effects is always available. Whether it explains everything reported is a different question.
The second is a figure, identified in accounts as the former proprietor, seen or sensed moving through the building's hallways at night. This category of claim — the lingering authority figure — appears at a significant percentage of hotel properties with long institutional histories. The Montezuma's particular history of multiple catastrophic fires and repeated institutional reinvention may contribute to the sense that the building has accumulated rather than shed its past.
The 1977 filming of The Evil added a contemporary layer. Some visitor accounts since then describe unease specifically in the tower areas, where the Shadowlands record notes women have been seen at night. Whether this reflects an older tradition or is influenced by the film's presence in the building's history is not documented.
The castle is an active educational campus. Its paranormal reputation does not appear to be commercially developed.
Notable Entities
UWC-USA students lead tours of the 90,000-square-foot Queen Anne castle, including its history as a Santa Fe Railroad luxury resort, Jesuit seminary, and filming location for the 1977 horror film The Evil. Tours are offered on pre-scheduled dates; contact UWC-USA directly to arrange.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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